By: Nick Mathews (UMass Amherst)
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Anyone who’s seen Miley Cyrus’ last music video knows two things for sure. One, it is physically, ethereally, blatantly, obviously impossible to tame her. The second is that she has dropped her Disney roots in favor of appealing to the MTV 18-49 male demographic. I’m actually quite a bit surprised by this move. Though the inevitability of child stars making the dark, scandal-ridden transformation into an edgier pop entity is undeniable, I felt that Miley had another year of Tiger Beat magazine articles and PG-penned ballads before she turned into Britney Spears.
I based this theory on the fact that she’s still 17… and I was wrong. In this industry, one more summer of dance anthem profits outweighs age of consent (in Massachusetts at least). This is why the entertainment industry rocks so much. Even with it comes to child stars, it’s completely lawless.
Back to Britney… uh, I mean Miley. Can you blame me, though, for making that mistake? I mean, listen to her new song. It’s a straight up electro-pop rip-off of half of Britney Spear’s last album’s singles. I mean, I haven’t listened to the album, cause it’s not really my jam, but “Can’t Be Tamed” could have easily replaced any of the Spears songs that have been pumping out of cheap frat sound systems over the past few years. All I’m trying to say is this: does Miley really want to build her career like Britney Spears did? I feel like that’s just asking for trouble. Furthermore, to steal a joke from a great show, Britney Spears is like the Dane Cook of pop. No offense to any Britney Spears fans, but she doesn’t exactly turn out gems anymore. Sure she charts, but so did Lady Antebellum. Point. Me. I mean, as far as female pop artists go these days, Britney Spears is kind of the bottom of the barrel. Her music is nowhere near as well produced as the latest Rihanna album, Rated R, and she takes herself too seriously to have that awesomely fun and bubbly Ke$ha approach. Yet again, I must digress. All I’m trying to say is that Miley’s production team went in a pretty silly direction. Don’t believe me? Does this make sense?
What about this?
Look. I’d totally hit that too, but that’s no excuse to make your music video look like a Joel Schumacher Batman and Robin action scene. Seriously, this is what I saw when I watched the music video for “Can’t Be Tamed”, albeit it was slightly more arousing.
For those of you who haven’t seen the ridiculous music video I am talking about, featuring Miley as a circus freak getting grinded up on by bro’s in faux-hawks, check it out below:
